


coming to grips

by theamazingkrypto



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotionally Repressed, F/F, Fluff, Gen, Hugs, One Shot Collection, Serious Injuries, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 10:51:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8202961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theamazingkrypto/pseuds/theamazingkrypto
Summary: Beruka receives hugs.





	1. Camilla

“Poor darling,” Camilla croons, feeling Beruka’s ever-warming forehead before pushing her fingers back to tuck a lock of blue hair behind her ear.

Beruka tries to respond, but dry, wretched coughs wrack her body. Camilla makes another sympathetic noise at the back of her throat and offers a glass of water before Beruka’s coughing fit subsided.

“Is there anything else you need?” Camilla asks. She hates this - this feeling of uselessness, but there isn’t anything she could do besides be there. Elise had already given her cold medcine. An empty bowl once filled with chicken soup sits on the nightstand and Beruka gulps down the water without any aid.

Once all the water is gone, Beruka hands her the glass and grabs a tissue. She blows her nose - sounding akin to a dying whale - and shakes her head in response to Camilla’s question. Camilla frowns.

Suddenly, the wooden shutters slam open with a sharp twack. The snow and the crisp wind take advantage of the opening, spilling in through the window. Camilla rushes over. She wrestles with the latch - already cold to the touch - for a moment before forcing it shut. She snatches up a previously discarded belt and reinforces the lock with it.

“There,” she says, hitting her cold hands on her thighs twice. The snow on the ground begins to melt from the heat of the fireplace. She turns on her heel to find Beruka shivering violently at the frosty air that had invaded the room. Poor darling, she thinks again.

She could find one of the butlers and send them to fetch extra linens, but she doesn’t want to leave Beruka alone, not while her love is suffering so. Selena will be back with more supplies soon, anyway. She checks to make sure the shutters are secure before making her way over to the bed.

Beruka fumbles for another tissue. She sneezes so loud people on the other side of town must have startled at the sound. She moans and curls into herself even further.

Carefully, Camilla peels back the covers, quickly replacing the empty space with her body before too much cold air could leak into Beruka’s little blanket cocoon.

“L-Lady C’milla?” Beruka mumbles. She doesn’t have enough energy to lift her head. Camilla slides closer, curling an arm around the assassin’s waist. “No,” she almost-whines, weakly shoving at Camilla’s hand. “You’ll g...you’lmm catch...sick.”

Camilla giggles. She pulls herself closer, hugging Beruka’s body to her own. She leans over to drop a kiss on her love’s feverish cheek. “That’s a risk I’ll take.”


	2. Niles

His fingers dig into her shoulders, using the grip to pull her towards him violently. If not for the way he sobs into her hair when she was close enough, a bystander might think he’s assaulting her.

They share similar pasts - abandoned by their parents, Beruka taken in by an assassin, Niles by thieves, their mothers even ended up buried in the same graveyard. The only point where their stories truly diverged is that Niles was the one betrayed while Beruka was the betrayer, and maybe that’s why Niles feels too much and Beruka too little.

They could have been friends. Maybe they are, in a better life. But in this one they’re a constant reminder about who they’re not.

Tears wet her hair. Beruka stands there silently, pilant in Niles’s hold as he gasps out wretched, full-body sobs.

Beruka hugs back.


	3. Selena

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for serious injuries.

The roughness of the stone wall digging into her back is grounding, though not as grounding as the gentle feel of Selena’s fingers as they slip into her own.

She does not bother to look up. She continues staring at the bandages covering her legs, running under her pants, wrapped around her torso.

From what little she remembered, Lady Camilla had, through tears, ordered Benny to carry her back to the med tent. When she woke up she learned that her armor was in the smithy, and she had gone to check on it. The blacksmith on duty said it wasn’t looking good, even after six days. They were surprised  _ she  _ made it, and even more so that she could walk.

_ I almost died _ , she thinks with a shudder. Then she wonders when she began to care about that.

Selena lifts her right arm - her only not injured limb - and presses her lips against the inside of her palm, and Beruka blinks. She has people who would actually care if she died now. The realization comes with a tsunami of feelings. Her eyes burn and her throat closes up, and she pointedly looks in the opposite direction of Selena.

Beruka knows she should be getting back to the med-tent. (A dirty, dark, damp alleyway isn’t the best place to heal.) She knows that’s why Selena came to find her, but she can’t. If she has to go back to all those sympathetic gazes and whispers the healers think she doesn’t hear…

Selena doesn’t snap at her to get back to the tent. She shifts to wrap her love in a one-armed hug. She tucks her head under Beruka’s chin, positioned just right so that she can feel the rise and fall of Beruka’s chest that had been ceased for the longest seconds of Selena’s life, and they don’t move.


	4. Benny

With no context given, Benny simply picks her up. Emphasis on  _ simply _ . He’s got two hundred pounds and nearly two feet on her. She feels akin to a rag doll, but the way he rubs up and down her back makes her feel more human. (Though she’s sure Benny would treat an inanimate object with the same care he does people.)

“What,” she says, “are you doing?”

“I’m not very good with words,” he reiterates from their conversation some days back. “But, uh…” He clears his throat and hugs Beruka a little tighter. Corrin had insisted all armor be checked before the upcoming battle, and Benny is warm under his tunic. “...we’re friends, right?”

She considers him. He is among the few to ever make an attempt to befriend her. While most of those few got frustrated with her blankness and their bleak conversation, Benny has never pushed her. He’s never tried to make her change just to add a little more life into their relationship. She guesses the reason why he seeks her out is because she’ll never try to change him either. She’s just fine with him being better at actions than words.

Hence the hug, she supposes, instead of more idle talk about not knowing how.

She wraps her arms around his neck and drops her head on his shoulder. “...Yes, I believe so.”


	5. Elise

Beruka froze as the child’s arms wrapped around her. When she had told the story, she only meant to teach Elise what could happen if she continued to misbehave. She had not meant for... _ this _ to happen.

She grunted and shoved the child off. “I do not need your pity,” she said, monotone voice almost a snarl.

“It’s not pity!” Elise insisted. “Trust me, I understand. It’s…” She laughed. Beruka was taken back at the raw bitterness of the sound. Elise ground the palm of her hand against her cheek to clear away the wetness accumulated there. She winced, like she was pressing down on a wound. “I’ve been there. Camilla and Leo and Xander all think I’m too young to understand, but I do. I know what it’s like to have a horrible father. And I know it’s hard - I know it’s hard for other people to trust people after, but…”

Elise sucked in a deep breath and squared her shoulders. They were on their way to kill her own father. She had just become a strategist; a child soldier at fourteen. Two years older than Beruka was when she drove a knife through her father’s chest. The ponderance makes Beruka...feel.

“...but,” Elise repeated, “I was hoping that you might trust me. And if you don’t...Leo said that hugs chemically help build trust, so…” She opened her arms. Beruka stood there, silent, and that was enough confirmation for Elise. She wrapped her arms around the assassin with no intention of letting go soon.

Beruka did not hug back. She stared at a point beyond Elise’s shoulder, and tried her best not to feel.


	6. Azura

Beruka wasn’t sure if she’d ever done anything in her entire life to deserve the smile Azura greets her with, but it’s there nonetheless. She firmly believes Azura would stop if she said something about it, so she didn’t.

“Are you ready for your dance lesson?” Azura asked.

Azura had been teaching her every other day in preparation for Lord Leo’s wedding. Beruka hadn’t planned on going within 5 meters of the dance floor, but Niles insisted she be the ring bearer and that she dance with the flower girl when they paired off for a flashy performance. (Somehow, all of their friends and Leo’s family had other roles, and, even more perplexing, Beruka had become close friends with the pair.)

“Yes,” Beruka answered. She set her axe and cloth next to the bottle of polish (“Gwads, Beruka, you can’t protect Lady Camilla when your axe is grimy.”) and stood.

Azura pecked her on the lips. She took Beruka’s hand and lead her to the middle of her quarters. Beruka didn’t own much, so there wasn’t anything to clear away before Azura deemed her floor suitable for dance practice.

Hands found their places and Azura started up a tune. One-two-three-four, one-two-three-four…

It wasn’t that she was a bad dancer; on their first lesson, she could keep up with Azura without stepping on her toes too much. By the second, no toes were getting smashed.

One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four…

She simply had no rhythm. She could copy Azura’s rhythm just fine, but finding the beat on her own? She hoped Azura had prepared Lady Elise to lead.

Azura slid both of her arms around Beruka’s waist, and that’s when she realized their waltz had become a sway.

“I thought we were practicing dancing,” Beruka commented, but made no attempt to start their dance again.

“Hmm-mm,” Azura agreed.

She leaned against Azura, slipping her hands over the songstress’s well-defined back and shoulders. Azura smelled nice, like the salty waves of the ocean. She was soft, like the moss that covered even the crudest of rocks. She was warm, like home.

Though she knew it was her job to protect Azura, Beruka felt safe in her arms. She couldn’t help but let her guard down and her eyelids close.

“I love you,” she murmured, and toe-curling pleasantness drifted through her body when Azura returned the endearment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~Azura totally beat-boxed Lost in Thoughts All Alone.~~

**Author's Note:**

> I'll gladly take requests for the person you think should give Beruka a hug. (Snuggling works too!) A prompt would be cool, too, especially if you want her to receive a hug from someone she already has gotten one from.
> 
> Reviews and kudos would be awesome!


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